For You
by Ameiko
Summary: Jayne has given everything for Zoe, but what now? Broken bodies and broken hearts take time to heal. Will Zoe realize what she has before it's too late? Post BDM Zoe/Jayne
1. Chapter 1

For You

For You

Chapter 1

Zoë's hands were covered in blood. The thick, half-dried, crimson substance was the only thing that she could see as she trembled. This wasn't the first time Zoë had been covered in a comrade's blood, but never had it been her fault before. Around her, the rest of the crew rushed to carry Jayne's broken body to the infirmary. Despite their efforts, Zoë knew that he would die. There was no way a man could bleed so much and live. Dear god, she was the reason Jayne was going to die!

The world became slightly hazy as she tried to force her legs to move. Next, there was nothing.

_"I don't like this," Jayne whispered roughly from behind a stone pillar. _

_From the next pillar over, Zoë had to stifle a grunt of agreement. "Jayne, let's just do the job," she said flatly._

_The pair sat in silence on the cold stone floor waiting for their mark. Zoë couldn't say that she liked the situation either, but it was part of the job. The plan was that Zoë and Jayne would ambush a group of undercover Alliance officers and relieve them of a package they were carrying. It was a bit more dangerous than anything they had attempted before, but these days the pickings were slim when it came to work. Combine that with the "more risk, more reward" factor, and the crew had unanimously decided to do the job. Still, there was just something about the lay of the land and the feel of the air that didn't sit right. _

_"I see 'em." _

_Zoë looked to the doorway of the small bar where four men now stood. Three of them, Zoë decided were highly trained. The fourth was the young scientist in charge of the contents of the briefcase now held firmly to his chest. He was the only one who seemed to be nervous at all. His eyes darted around him, trying to see into the surrounding shadows._

_Looking back to her left, she saw Jayne raise his gun in a questioning manner. Zoë nodded and raised her own firearm. In one smooth, synchronized action both of them opened fire. _

_As always, Jayne's marksmanship was near perfect. His first shot dropped one of the officers with a well-placed shoulder wound—non-lethal, but enough to keep him from getting back up. Zoë didn't have time to admire Jayne's work. Bullets flew by her head, and she did her best to answer them accordingly. _

_When only the shaking scientist was left standing, Zoë moved out into the open. "Drop the case nice and easy. This can all be over quickly," she told him steadily._

_The scientist laughed mechanically. "This wasn't supposed to be like this. Our back up is on its way."_

_"No it ain't," Jayne scoffed from the shadows. "Seems they had a bit of engine trouble on the way here."_

_Kaylee, Mal, and River had done their part of the job earlier. River served as an all-too-tempting decoy to the keep the good little soldiers busy while the mechanic managed to sneak into the officers' ship to dismantle enough of their engine to keep them firmly grounded and without radio contact. Shortly, the crew—minus Kaylee and River who were getting the ship prepped for take off—would meet them right here and they'd make their get away._

_"Drop the case," Zoë repeated sternly._

_"I have orders," the young man replied in a voice that betrayed his fear._

_"Orders ain't gonna keep ya alive, boy. Drop the Gorram case!" Jayne yelled with his most intimidating stare in place._

_"Do you know what they'll do to my wife if I don't follow orders?" the scientist asked becoming eerily calm. "I really do need to follow orders."_

_At first, Zoë wasn't entirely sure what was about to happen. Her instincts failed her…Jayne's didn't. _

_In one quick motion, Jayne leapt from behind the pillar and pushed her away from the blast. It seemed like time stopped. Zoë saw the scientist pull the detonator from his coat. After that, it was all a blur. The bright flash of unimaginable heat preceded the deafening boom. Jayne saved her life._

"I think she's comin' around," a familiar female voice said from above her. Zoë's eyes fluttered open to see Kaylee's face hovering over her._  
_

Zoë groaned. "How'd I get here?" she asked looking around her bunk.

"Inara and I managed to get you down here while they were working on Jayne," Kaylee replied solemnly. "Mal and River were helping Simon."

The question was right on her lips, but she was too afraid of the answer. She didn't know if she could bare to hear that Jayne was dead because of her stupidity. In her mind's eye, she could see his prone form, half hidden by debris, burned and bleeding.

Kaylee knew what her friend was thinking. "Simon's still working on him. It's bad, Zoë. It's real bad."

Zoë let out a breath. He was alive. How could he still be alive? "How long was I out?"

"Bout three hours," Kaylee replied biting her lip. "I was startin' to get scared about you too, but with Jayne…I ain't never seen a body burned like that, Zoë."

Usually, Zoë would say something to comfort the younger woman, but right now she just couldn't. Memories invaded Zoë's thoughts. She had seen plenty of men burned, seen bodies desecrated in ways she had never imagined. She'd just never seen someone burned like that and live. Jayne HAD to live. Wuh de Tyen, why had Jayne saved her?

Zoë ignored the sharp pain in her head and the ache in her back as she got off her bunk. She needed to see for herself what was going on in that infirmary. The floor began to spin as Zoë stood up straight.

"I don't think you should try to go anyway." Kaylee moved to support her friend.

Zoë groaned. "I need to know what's going on down there."

"Want me to have a look?" Kaylee asked.

Zoë nodded. "Please."


	2. Chapter 2

Well, I have to say that I am still not a hundred percent dedicated to this story. My Hunger Games fic will take precedence, but I DO want to finish this. I don't have a beta for this yet. Anyone who is up for a challenge, PM me. Also, I will say this only once, I am not interest in canon beyond the series and movie.

Chapter 2

Jayne was in Hell. Had to be Hell. Ain't no way his body could be so damned hot and cold at the same time without him havin' been sent to the far bellow. He tried to move his arms, but found them too gorram heavy to budge. His eyes cracked open—well, the right one did, there was somethin' covering the left—and saw only bright light for a moment. The room came into focus and he realized he was in the infirmary, but he didn't know why. Jayne let out a small grunt of pain as his head began to swim.

"Jayne! Oh thank God, you're awake!" A familiar voice cried from beside him.

He tried to turn his head to face Kaylee, but found he couldn't quite do it. "Water," he managed to rasp through his burnt and parched lips.

Kaylee stood up and he could finally see the young mechanic. She looked like hell, so he could only imagine how bad off he must be. Still crying, she held a cup to his lips and gave him just a few drops to ease his pain. "I've got to go get Simon," she told him as she took away the cup.

Jayne wanted to ask for more, but couldn't quite get the words to come before she shot up out of the room.

Alone again, Jayne began to try to figure out what the hell had happened to him. His body was swaddled up in bandages like a goram mummy. Every inch of him hurt right down to his unseen toes. Doc must have put him in one of those neck braces again, he realized as he tried to sit up to look at himself. Nothin' moved like it should. It took damn near all his might to wiggle the fingers on his right hand.

"Don't try to move too much," Simon's steady Core tones told him from the doorway. In a split second, the doc was hoverin' over him checking him out from one end to the other. It was the first time that Jayne ever recalled bein' glad for the doc's gentle hands.

"Do you know what happened?" Simon asked softly as he prepared some kinda shot.

"No," Jayne croaked roughly.

"There was an explosion on the last job," Simon began.

Just then a memory flooded Jayne's mind. Panic gripped him. "Zoe?"

"She's fine. Just a minor concussion and some scrapes," Simon assured him. "Jayne, I'm not going to lie to you: You've got third degree burns over seventy percent of your body. I've done grafts where I can, but I couldn't save your left eye and your left hand was crushed pretty badly. You're lucky to still be alive."

Simon's words didn't all quite sink in. He didn't really understand what the doc meant by "couldn't save. " Things began to blur around Jayne. Vaguely he felt the a needle go into him, but didn't have time to wonder about it before he began to drift off.

Zoe arrived just in time to see Simon put Jayne back under with a shot. The doctor had told them all that it would be best to keep Jayne under a medically induced coma for a few days. The whole crew had been spending alternating vigils at the merc's bedside watching over his slumbering form. Zoe wouldn't have left him, but both the captain and Simon had threatened to carry her out if she didn't leave by her own power.

"How is he?" Zoe asked as she stepped inside.

Simon gave a sad smile. "Incredibly tough. I can't believe he came to with all of the drugs I've given him, but he was awake and lucid for about five minutes. He's a fighter."

"He is," Zoe agreed as she stared down at his bandaged body. It ripped at her heart to stare down at the covered half of his once handsome face. She'd seen what lay under there once when Simon was changing the dressings. Jayne's body looked like scorched meat. Simon had told her time and time again that the skin grafts were taking and that it wouldn't be as bad as she was imagining, but how could it not be? The worst part was that she knew that Jayne had been injured saving her. He would be missing an eye and horribly scarred because she couldn't keep up her part in the plan.

"Jayne actually seemed more worried about you than what had happened to him," Simon commented as he rearranged the sheet covering the injured man.

Zoe looked away. She couldn't even think about that right now. The guilt was just too damn much. She reached out and touched the unburned part of Jayne's face, letting her fingers slide over the near week's worth of growth covering his jaw. "Do you think he'll recover?"

"I think he has a long way to go," Simon said with a frown. "I'm not really a therapist and this ship isn't exactly designed to handle the kind of rehabilitation he's going to need. Pretty soon, we'll need him to start moving the joints covered by the grafts so they don't end up getting locked up underneath new growing skin. He'll need to learn to adjust to the changes in his sight and to using his left hand again. It's a lot, Zoe. And that's just the physical side to things."

"He should have just gotten himself to safety and left me," Zoe muttered.

"Zoe, you can't blame yourself. By now, I think we all know what can go wrong on a job," Simon told her softly.

She nodded and pulled her sweater tighter around her. The chill she felt had nothing to do with the cold, but she could try to pretend.

"I'll sit with him for a bit," she offered.

Simon frowned, but didn't argue. He looked haggard—much older than he had even a week earlier. The doctor hadn't been sleeping much. Even with the help of the crew, Jayne needed near round the clock monitoring. If they had access to a hospital, Simon undoubtedly would have demanded they take the injured man there for the specialized care he needed, but this was the best they could offer at present. Zoe supposed he must be feeling almost as guilty as she was, but didn't comment on it.

Once Zoe was alone with Jayne, she sat down in the same chair Kaylee had occupied only a few minutes before and watched the steady rise and fall of Jayne's chest. She wasn't sure if she was glad or not that she had missed Jayne's awakening. As much as she prayed every night that he would wake and be all right, she didn't know quite what to say to him when he did. An apology seemed to pale and weak in the wake of what had happened. And then there was the question that still lingered: why did Jayne keep saving her? He'd laid his life on the line for her on Miranda and again on the last job, but why?

Zoe could recall when Jayne first joined the crew. She hadn't been married to Wash just yet, and she had to admit that she had been intrigued by the big man. He was brash, arrogant, uneducated, and rude, but there was a certain elegance to him. He moved like a man who had come into his profession through natural talent, not training—nothing forced, nothing planned. Still, there was just something plain off-putting about him that had nothing to do with the gun he'd pulled on them the first time they met him. It was like he was trying to convince himself that he was an evil man—maybe even worse than just outright being an evil man. Over time, though, she'd just come to ignore him for the most part. He was the storm cloud hovering just at the edge of the horizon. Nothing in all of the years she'd known him pointed to why he'd save her. It was a mystery.

Sometime during the night, Zoe must have drifted off for an unknown period of time. She stared up at the clock on the wall trying to determine just how long she'd been there, but then she noticed she was being watched. Jayne's lone blue eye was locked on her, yet he made no attempt to speak.

"I'll get Simon," she said, assuming he needed more pain medication. She squeezed his unwrapped hand to try and comfort him, but his fingers grasped at hers with surprising strength.

"No shot...water," he managed to whisper.

Zoe nodded. "All right. I'll get some."

Her fingers trembled as she held the cup to his lips. She knew that to give him too much would make him sick, and she felt a stab of guilt as she pulled it away from his dry lips. He made a sound of protest, but she shook her head. "Not too much just yet. I'll give you more in a minute," she assured him.

Jayne seemed content with her answer. He held out his palm for hers, which she gave willingly. "Gonna die?"

"No, Jayne. You're not gonna die. Simon's going to get you all patched up," she told him forcing a smile.

"My eye's gone," he stated flatly. Though he was probably too drugged to really grasp the concept yet, the calmness he had about it was a mite unnerving.

Zoe swallowed hard. "It is."

"My hand?"

"The doc saved it. It may not ever be the same, but it's there."

Jayne blinked groggily and groaned. "No more sleep. Don't wanna sleep."

"I know," she said softly as she began gently stroking his hair. "You need to, though. Rest up now, and prepare to fight like hell later. I know you can do it, Jayne."

"For you."

The words caught Zoe off guard, and for a second she could barely breathe. Jayne wasn't an emotional kind of guy. Even at the worst of things, she'd never once heard him say a word about how he or anyone else really felt. It just wasn't his way. _This is the drugs talking,_ she reminded herself.

"Fight to get better," she amended, regaining her composure.

He shook his head. "Fight for you. Thousand reavers. Whole gorram Alliance. For you."

Before she could contemplate his words, Jayne's eye fluttered closed.

"Kao," Zoe muttered to herself. She buried her face in her hands, and fought back the bile that was rising.

The next day Simon began stepping down the amount of drugs Jayne was on. The doctor reasoned that if the merc was struggling that hard, they could at the very least try and help him channel it all into the next stage of his recovery. Zoe listened to Simon's plans for his patient, but said nothing and didn't offer any help. She had to stay away from him. Nothing good would come from sitting at his bedside anymore. Coward that she was, she couldn't face him again.

Amazingly, not even a full week after the explosion, Jayne was sitting up in bed and even eating small amounts of bland protein on his own. Barely a handful of days after that, he was able to stand a little. The whole crew was rallied behind Jayne. Simon took excellent care of him. Mal was always there to extend a helping hand or a much needed shove. Inara provided a calming influence. Kaylee brightened the room with her chatter. Even River helped. The girl seemed to be the one who Jayne allowed to push him the most. Only Zoe offered no help. If the rest of the crew questioned her behavior, they didn't say so.

Zoe spent her days filling in the gaps where she could for the rest of the crew. Usually, day to day chores were split amongst them all, but she had taken on just about everything from cooking to laundry. Anything to keep herself away from the infirmary and occupied. Every so often, she would walk past and catch a glimpse of Jayne or hear him talking to one of the others. It made her chest tighten, but she didn't force herself to go see him. She knew that sooner or later she would have to face him. Somehow, she just kept telling herself it would be "later."


End file.
